A la recherche d’une mythologie de la vieille Europe. Le sang du dragon : Siegfried, Finn, Taliesin et Tiresias
Searching for a Mythology of Ancient Europe. The Dragon’s Blood: Siegfried, Finn, Taliesin and Tiresias

Summary/Abstract: Could there have existed an ancient mythology common to most of the European countries? By taking into consideration a series of ancient and medieval works, and examining as precisely as we can several initiation myths, from the Scandinavian myth of Siegfried and the dragon Fafnir, to the Irish myth of Finn and the salmon of knowledge, or the Greek myth of the soothsayers Tiresias and Melampous, whose ears were purified by serpents, an affirmative answer can be offered to this question. The similarity of the motifs in such diverse stories allows us to presume that a different evolution emerged from the same cultural (linguistic and mythological) pattern. Moreover, a comparison with several European tales gathered throughout the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries illustrates the invariance of these mythical motives inherited from the most archaic European past, attesting the existence of a remote common cultural background. The acquisition of supreme knowledge (simultaneously sovereignty and divination) is a consequence of the intercession of a monster or beast (a serpent, a dragon, or a salmon), and of its absorption, under strictly defined conditions, by a preordained hero.

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